We think of body shaming as a form of bullying, gossip, or something that happens extrinsically through communication like the media. In my experience, someone calling me fat or chubby hurts my feelings a bit, but the insults that I’ve formulated to shame my own body are 10x worse.

Before living in Brazil, I never realized the crazy tactics I had taken to avoid wearing a swimsuit. The last time I was excited to go swimming, without the fear of what I would look like in a swimsuit, I was an adolescent. Once I reached my teenage years, I recall ditching opportunities to spend time with my friends because they wanted to go to the pool, showing up to parties “late” so that I could avoid pool activities, and the list goes on.

In September, my study abroad program took us on a trip to Paraty, a historic colonial town in the state of Rio de Janeiro. It was by far one of my best vacations, and it was jam-packed with beach activities. When we arrived to our first beach stop, everyone was ecstatic. All the ladies already had their swimsuits on underneath their clothes. Prior to the trip, I tried on my bikini and nearly broke into tears. I hated the way my body looked, so I left it behind.

When I voiced to my program director and chaperon that I didn’t have a swimsuit, thinking I had once again dodged that bullet, they told me there were vendors on the beach selling cheap bikinis. At that moment, I realized I had to get over my fear.

Luckily, I didn’t have to do it alone. One of the ladies in my business program was right by my side helping me pick out a bikini and she even found one for herself. Once we changed into our new swim gear, we hit the beach and no one body shamed me, not even myself.

In Brazil, there's not one body type that you won’t see wearing a bikini on the beach. It’s not just limited to women, speedos are very common as well. And there’s no age limits on who should wear what. It’s such a different experience than what I’m accustomed to in the US. In the city of São Paulo, I see women of all different body types wear whatever they want on a daily basis and it’s never a problem. Whereas in the US, people are very sensitive about how people dress, and throughout the years, I’ve fallen victim to that very mindset.

Body shaming is a way to put limitations on your existence. It’s a concept that has left me loving my body in some cases and hating my body in others. It should never be that way. While I've overcome my fear, I'm still striving towards a more positive body image. I challenge you to find a place in your life that makes you uncomfortable, and wear it shamelessly.

I’d love to hear how you overcame or are currently struggling with a form of body shaming in your own life. Please share your story below in the comments section.

whitewashing and identity: A comparison between two cultures

The ideals behind identity and the very dreaded existence of labels is very different in Brazil than in the US. In the US, I am labeled as black, female, heterosexual, cis-gender, and Christian, which string along other positive and negative labels. In Brazil, I'm not quite sure because I live with a middle-class Brazilian family, in a nice area of Sao Paulo, and I attend a prestigious university. My uncertainty derives from Brazil's history. Brazil was the last country in the western hemisphere to abolish slavery in 1888. By that time, Africans consumed a great portion of the country's population, which lead to government imposed miscegenation or whitening of the population. So why do I have this uncertainty of what’s white and what’s black in Brazil? One reason is because of a historical survey conducted in 1976 by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. In the survey, Brazilians were asked to state the color they thought they were without the restrictions of the typical categories of white, pardo, and black. The survey revealed 136 different responses﻿﻿ (pages 27-30). This survey reveals how subjective race is whereas in the US, any amount of African ancestry means that you’re black.

Another reason is because of the elite. If you're rich or in a position of power and you look like me, you're not black. You're white. It's a concept that dates back to when former African slaves would buy their freedom and later gain positions of power that eradicated their blackness. However, this concept does not prevent people of color from discrimination or racism.

Just from my day-to-day experiences in Brazil, no one could sell to me that it's a racial democracy, that everyone's mixed, or that race does not exist here. People of color make up more than 50% of the population, but over 70% of the poor and well over half of the unemployed. It's definitely more complex than in the US because people of color are the majority, but it boils down to the same societal message: blackness is not equivalent to white. For example, the renowned Brazilian soccer player, Neymar da Silva Santos Jr., was asked in 2010 if he had ever been a victim of racism. He responded:

His response was very fitting since he had never traveled outside of the country and in Brazil, he isn't black. While it's challenging to explain, it's important to note that preto/a is the Brazilian equivalent to the n-word. Whereas negro/a is the appropriate way to say you're black, and moreno/a is a euphemism for blackness. Take a glance at some of these recent to older pictures of Neymar, Jr. The pictures reveal a form of physical whitening over the years.

With the recent outrage over Raven-Symoné's remarks as a co-host on The View, there's something very concerning happening to her identity that's similar to Neymar. We want to attack Raven for her self-hating remarks, but really we're ignoring the most important message about why she even believes these things. We're ignoring what Neymar's transformation actually means. These two scenarios, among many others, reveal that we base our self-worth upon a societal standard of whiteness. I'll never forget when I told my parents that I wanted to stop relaxing/straightening my hair and that I wanted to be natural. They cringed with fear out of the idea of their daughter becoming "too black". Too black to get a job. Too black to be successful. Too black to survive in a society that puts whiteness on a pedestal. This is a heartbreaking phenomenon that I've chosen to tackle because labels are the very reasons why we hurt and destroy one another. Your labels are created by the outside world looking in on your existence. Your identity is you looking within yourself into the outside world. Your labels mean nothing. But your identity is important to you and those around you. Your identity is the difference between self-love and self-hate. I struggle with my identity because all I've ever found is that this world does not identify with me, which is why all the intangible aspects of your identity matter just as much as the physical. Don't let this world's labels dictate who you are. You make your identity and that alone is worthy of all of your love.